Biz Break: Jive Software CEO Tony Zingale steps down

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Palo Alto's Jive Software may be the next hot social media startup to make a run for the IPO gates. Led by veteran CEO Tony Zingale, the company makes a "Facebook for the enterprise" application that's been adopted by major Fortune 500 companies including News Corp. and Nike. (Dai Sugano/Mercury News)

Elisa Steele has been named president and acting CEO of Jive Software. (Jive Software photo)

Jive Software CEO Tony Zingale announced his retirement from the helm of the Palo Alto company Tuesday, while also detailing another quarter of improved financial performance, leading to a big stock bump.

Zingale on Nov. 10 will become executive chairman of the company he has led for five years, providing an opportunity for Elisa Steele, who was promoted to president and will serve as interim CEO with help from board member Bill Lanfri until a new leader is named.

Zingale said Steele could win the CEO job permanently, and expects the final decision by the end of the first quarter of 2015.

“The board has a responsibility to exhaust all its choices. But Elisa is the leading candidate internally,” he told Recode in an interview Tuesday. “She’s been my partner at this company in rejuvenating our strategy.”

Jive’s rejuvenation led to revenue gains of more than 28 percent in 2013 and further improvement so far in 2014. The enterprise-software company, which offers social-networking-style collaboration for business similar to Microsoft’s Yammer, beat expectations in the third quarter with a net loss of $12.1 million, or 17 cents a share, on sales of $46.6 million, year-over-year sales growth of 24.7 percent.

Steele said in Tuesday’s conference call that Jive signed more new contracts in the third quarter than it had in a single period in nearly two years, including deals with Barnes and Noble, Thomson Reuters and Burger King.

“I look forward to helping lead the company, along with Bill, into its next phase of growth,” Steele added in the conference call.

Steele joined Jive earlier this year as chief marketing officer in January after stints at Yahoo and NetApp, and was quickly promoted to executive vice president of marketing and products. In an interview with The Mercury News earlier this year, Steele discussed what she learned watching the negative reaction to the reign of Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz, whom she worked under from 2009 to 2011.

“I learned you always have another chance,” she said. “You can always wake up the next morning and go for it. You don’t ever give up.”

Jive shares jumped more than 18 percent in after-hours trading following the announcement, moving close to $7 after closing with a 2.3 percent decline at $5.89. The company has struggled to live up to the price it commanded in a 2011 initial public offering, when shares sold for $12.

Milpitas security company FireEye was battered in late trading after releasing its quarterly report, dropping more than 20 percent. FireEye’s revenues came up about $2 million shy of analysts’ projections at $114 million, and the company’s projections for the current quarter suggest it could struggle to hit Wall Street’s expectations of more than $144 million. Shares dropped to near $27 after closing with a 1.7 percent gain at $34.25. Silicon Valley biotechs performed better after releasing their earnings reports: Sunnyvale-based Pharmacyclics gained slightly, Genomic Health added about 2 percent, Impax Laboratories retreated a bit after splurging on acquisitions last quarter, and Bio-Rad held steady after releasing earnings on the heels of a bribery settlement with the U.S. government.

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